Indigenous and Afro-Descendant’s Rights & Resources and REDD-s

Implications for decision-making and participation in Climate Mitigation Deborah Barry

LLILAS, UT, Austin April 1st, 2010 Rights and Resources Initiative

WHO is the Rights and Resources Initiative ?

• A Coalition of 12 international, regional and community organizations working in the forests of Africa, Asia and Latin America

• With a Common recognition that secure forest tenure is essential to human development and sustainable use of forest resources

•Common goal of promoting pro-poor forest tenure, policy, and market reforms in 12- 15 countries (in LA= Guatemala, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Peru, and regionally) www.rightsandresources.org Presentation

I. Tenure reform: In LA Indigenous and community territories

II. REDD and plus: where things stand

IV. Implications for Indigenous and Afro-descendant territories The State of Statutory Forest Land Tenure Today Trends: Some Progress But Not Much Latin America, the leader, indigenous territories the largest

• Of the worlds forests under some kind of community control 65% are in Latin America. (approx. 215 million hectares)

• Roughly, just under 90% of that amount is indigenous lands or territories.

• So almost 60% of the forest tenure reform we are discussing globally, is on indigenous lands in Latin America!

• In LA, the overwhelming majority in tropical lowlands of Amazon Basin and Central American lowlands.

Last Great Global Land Grab Underway Local control? Strength of local resource rights in policy and practice in eight countries

Strong local Weak local tenure ‘on paper’ tenure ‘on paper

Strong local Brazil, Malaysia tenure ‘in practice’ Weak local Nicaragua, Guyana, DRC, tenure ‘in Cameroon, PNG Indonesia practice’

• Note to table: ‘On paper’ indicators are based on policy and law; ‘in practice’ indicators are based on evidence from available literature and the authors’ opinion. The question marks are intended to emphasize the subjectivity in this assessment. It is not aimed at pigeon-holing countries but at provoking discussion. Tenure in REDD: Start-point or after thought? Cotula and Mayers, 2008 Pressures on rural land and territories

• Dramatic expansion of subsoil extraction rights Mining Amazon Basin Hydrocarbon Central America

• Expansion of Biofuels

• Global land grabs for food production

• Conservation: Protected Areas & Reserves

• REDD and Voluntary Carbon Markets: another value added to the forests, w/ a market Tenuous nature of and challenges to land & resource rights

Challenges • The indigenous have a high profile and strong international support, but weak and narrow base of political support at the country level. • Generally, small populations in large territories with governance structures existing mostly at community/settlement level. • Tension over economic use of the land: between historic and subsistence use of land (hunting, gathering,fishing,swidden) and proposals for Sustainable Forest, or Community Forest Management. • High competition for use of resources on and “below” their land: expansion of biofuel production and extractive industry. II. Process: Bali & the ImplementaciónRoad to REDDmientras- refocusing: Confusion on forests

• Multitud de fondos, acuerdos y proyectos • At– theFondos internationalbilaterales (Australia)level in Bali in December 2007, governments– Fondos Norwegos agreed under the United Nations Framework Convention– FCPF – Banco on ClimateMundial Change (UNFCCC) : – UN-REDD – FIP• seek to reach agreement on a number of cross-cutting issues – Legislationby the 15th EEUU Conference en proceso ofde the lanzarse Parties- en in grandeDecember 2009 in – MercadoCopenhagen. Voluntario : estados, paises, corporaciones, compañias

• Crea espacios•This processy tentaciones - calledpara the "negociosBali Roadturbios Map" (Liberia- included and Papua New Guinea) negotiations centered around the four thematic "building blocks" • Pilotos pueden ser los casos mejores, ´boutique´no la realidad a escala of adaptation, mitigation, technology, and financing. Land use, • Las instancias gubernamentales están apurados para organizarse internamenteland-use para change posicionarse and forestry frente awas las negociacionesanother key topic. y el mercado (los Min, forestales, RREX, Finanzas, Energia Challenges to Climate Change: Mitigation = REDD

Reductión of Emissions from and Degradation

•Forests emissions = 20% of total global emisiones (now less)

•Seen as ‘ low-hanging fruit’

• Forests are source & sink

• Mechanism to buy time for developed country while re- tooling to new energy schemes and green industry. REDD & REDD Readiness

Have something in place by 2012 - Kyoto protocal /CDM Afforestation and

Original logic: Avoided Deforestation (reduce emissions) Tasks: . Define the Drivers of Deforestation . Baselines: need for a starting point to measure reductions- Forest inventories and Carbon measurement . Define Who Owns the Carbon?: legal of ownership rights (opens up the Pandora’s Box of forest tenure and governance) . Contract legality and Forest Management: who guarantees? . Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) International Process: Assumptions ……challenged • Funding and rapid action would be forthcoming and work • A solid and shared understanding of causes of deforestation • Monitoring capacities were adequate • REDD could go to scale quickly • It would be cheap and easy to pay/buy communities • REDD funds could give everyone what they need • Decisions in Copenhagen could be implemented rapidly Countries face problems………

– Demonstrating drivers of forest deforestation and degradation is difficult and often contentious (what scale & to use to find causes= policy and power relations)

– How to effectively reduce both? (poor past history, broken models= conservation, overlap of rights, extractive boom, expansion of infrastructure (IIRSA)

– 1st models: avoided deforestation = pay the perpetrators? • To reduce fires, stop illegal logging, (anti-industry),supress swidden agriculture (anti-indigenous), thwart conversion of forests to agriculture (anti-campesino)

– Demonstrate that the country as a whole has reduced their net rate of deforestation and forest degradation = prevent “leakage.” Reactions to REDD

• To pay the perpetrators is a perverse incentive • It leaves out the stewards and those who have conserved the forests • It could limit the rights of access, use and benefits from forest dwellers. • Pilot or subnational projects could limit the scale of testing actions, when the causes are at the national level (policy/power) •Lends itself to ‘leakage’ and thus undermines the entire effort of a global accounting system. • Doesn’t offer sufficient capacity for the demand for CO2 offsets in the international market. REDD+ (plus) the push to broaden the concept

REDD (plus) needs to include

• Sustainable forest management (SFM- natural forests)

• Forest Conservation

• Restauration of degraded areas (Plantaciones?)

• Possibly include afforestación and reforestación? (bring in Kyoto) REDD (+) implicaciones y preocupaciones

Implications • Conserve, reforest and restore forests opens up an enormous range of participants who could be rewarded and the forms of mitigation • It becomes a positive incentive, rewarding ‘ good behavior’ • It could mean including CO2 sequestration efforts similar to the market ones • Implies the absolute need for baselines and MRV to be put in place @ national level

• Some see this as a possible driver for a new ‘rural development model “

Concerns • It will increase the pressure over land and forest resources of those with weak rights to them • If SFM wins as a REDD+ scheme, industry could continue to have control and be compensated for it. • Protected Areas could grow and proliferate and threaten local rights • Afforestation could foment massive forest plantations on agricultural or degraded land • If there is no accepted international system, neighboring non-signing countries would suffer from border ‘leakage’ • Regulate and supervise so many different options is overwhelming to states & agencies. Panorama moves ahead and grows complex……

1- REDD+ process ( Paris/Oslo discussions on global architecture, funding mechanisms & safeguards) $3.5 BILLION pledged- how to operationalise

2- REDD “Readiness” - donors support countries to prepare for participation (WB- FCPF, UNREDD, others)

3- Governments and civil society groups are divided: national vs. sub-national levels and mechanisms.

4- Funds vs/and Voluntary Carbon Market

5- Players multiply: countries, states w/in, private corps, MRVers, donors, special funds, etc.. Tenure Rights and Governance capacity over territories : the Key

• The insecurity of tenure rights is now a known cause of deforestation, but dificult to quantify (Eliasch Review 2008)

• The larger the community forests and the stronger the authority systems the better the results for CO2 retention, biodiversity and livelihood improvement. (Agrawal 2008)

• The effectiveness of any forest based mitigation effort is seriously compromised if local rights to resources and the benefits derived from them are not considered. REDD + could serve to ……

• Assure forest lands for dependant communities, indigenous territories, ……

Or it could…

• Threaten the tenuous rights they already have – Reconcentration of state lands (public domain) – Produce ‘push back’ from those who feel threatened by state deals with international agents – Divide the social movements and their organizations Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities

Need to organize to influence above…..to

1 Pressure for REDD+ and readiness programs to invest at the local level to continue the tenure reform and clarity of (fund demarcación and titling )

2 Push their governments to endorse REDD+ and MRV at the national level to avoid leakage.

3 Assure that the definitions of ‘ causes of deforestation’ are at the national level and not unfairly biased.

5 Allign with honest researchers to particpate in the establishment of ‘baselines’ and data banks and cadasters, to assure fair play from the beginning.

6 Resist the temptation to engage in ‘easy deals’ for the sale of CO2 when rights are not clear and the buyer is not known or well references. Internally, communities need to….

1 Push for clarifying their lands and resource use, who has what rights : mapping and visibility, representation and interests in negotiation

2 Strengthen their own local systems of governance and resource management.

3 Work on understanding the internal costs for participation in REDD+ and proposals for benefit distribution, if they decide to engage. (combat expectation raising)

3 Work fervently to open dialogue with peasant organizations to see about possible resolutions , so as to not fall into the recurring trap of ‘ the poor being pitted against the poor’ REDD+ responses: many and varied positions Framework for Ensuring Effective Investment in Climate Change Adaptation & Mitigation in Forest Areas • Legal & Institutional • Accountable Funding Framework Mechanisms

Who to pay or StrengthenWho’s forest, rights who’s and Prioritize carbon and how to compensate and how regulategovernance the market? doinvestments we hold them in communitiesaccountable?

· Carbon sequestered and maintained · Rights respected OUTCOMES · Livelihoods supported · Forests conserved

• Independent Advisory • Information & & Auditing Monitoring Infrastructure

How to ensure Establish national and How to monitor, ensure representation, Monitor more than international transparency and independent voice, and carbon mechanisms access? auditing? Thank You www.rightsandresources.org [email protected] Easy References

Foreign Direct Investment – Win-Win or Land Grab? http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/wsfs/Summit/WSFS_Issues_papers/WSFS_FDI_E.pdf Foreign Investors Rush to Lock Up Food Supply, Globe and Mail, November 17 Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi calls it the "new feudalism." Groups representing peasant farmers call it "land grabs." The United Nations literature dispersed at this week's UN food summit in Rome calls it "direct foreign investment." • http://v1.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/GAM.20091117.FOOD17ART2310/TPStory/TPComment • UN to Regulate Farmland Grab Deals, Financial Times, November 18 • The United Nations has started drawing up a code of conduct to regulate overseas investment in farmland, but the voluntary rules will not be ready for at least a year. The code is the first attempt to control the growing trend of so-called “farmland grab” deals, which involve rich countries such as Saudi Arabia and South Korea investing in overseas farming to boost their own food security. • http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/be986784-d3a4-11de-8caf-00144feabdc0,dwp_uuid=a955630e-3603-11dc-ad42-0000779fd2ac.html • Gaddafi Asks Food Summit to Stop Africa "Landgrab," New York Times, November 16 • Libya's Muammar Gaddafi called for an end to the purchase of African farmland by food-importing nations at a U.N. hunger summit on Monday, describing it as "new feudalism" which could spread to Latin America as well. • http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/11/16/world/international-us-food-summit-land.html?scp=6&sq=world%20food%20summit&st=cse

REDD Process • Bali Road Map: Key Issues Under Negotiation (Compilation Document) • Financing Under the Bali Road Map: Designing, Governing, and Delivering Funds • Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions: Key Issues for Consideration • Outcomes of Copenhagen: the Negotiations & the Accord (released today) • http://www.undpcc.org/content/negotiations-en.aspx • UN-REDD Year in Review 2009 (RRI’s role mentioned on page 11 and 12) • http://www.unredd.net/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_download&gid=1692&Itemid=53 • Quick References

• Bali Road Map: Key Issues Under Negotiation (Compilation Document) • Financing Under the Bali Road Map: Designing, Governing, and Delivering Funds • Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions: Key Issues for Consideration • Outcomes of Copenhagen: the Negotiations & the Accord (released today) • http://www.undpcc.org/content/negotiations-en.aspx • • UN-REDD Year in Review 2009 (RRI’s role mentioned on page 11 and 12) • http://www.unredd.net/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_download&gid=1692&Ite mid=53